Jeymes Samuel’s "The Book of Clarence" centers the strained relationship between twin brothers Clarence and Thomas (both played by LaKeith Stansfield). Clarence is a street pharmacist who, abandoned by his twin for the rumored Messiah, decides to pull a messianic hoax of his own. Each brother struggles under the weight of Roman occupation. Thomas retreats from the world, following a messiah at the expense of his relationship with his own mother and brother. Clarence courts trouble, borrowing money he can’t repay and selling products the Roman government can’t tax.
In Samuel’s color-conscious casting of Black citizens of Jerusalem and the white Roman soldiers who police them, it’s hard to miss that the Roman soldiers grip their breastplates like contemporary police officers grip their vests. If that similarity wasn’t enough, Clarence’s mother hits the nail on the head when she screams, “They always take our babies!” as the Romans whip her son, marching him up the Hill of Golgotha to a premature death. I struggled through the brutal crucifixion scene, resentment for the Romans bubbling up each time Samuel brought another mourner into the camera’s frame — Clarence’s mother, his best friend, a neighborhood rival, the girl he loved. His twin brother Thomas. It was easy to transpose that resentment from these fictional, historical figures to the bad actors who stole my big brother’s last breath on a cross of labored breath built years before we were born.
